Quick note: We are planning to do an AMA on Reddit, next Tuesday 3rd Sept, around 5pm UK time. Feel free to drop in and ask us anything! We will announce details via Twitter.

It’s time to rethink your prison layouts! Prisoners can now dig escape tunnels, using tools they’ve stolen from around the prison. They will do their best to dig around buildings and walls (which slow them down), and they will even co-operate and join up their tunnels and dig together to escape quicker. If they manage to tunnel outside your outer wall they will dig up out of the ground in a puff of dirt, and make a run for it. And we don’t have snipers in the game yet, so it’s just tough luck if they make it that far.

An important thing to realise is that when prisoners are tunnelling, they are actually deep underground and often far away from their cell. However you will still see them in bed asleep. If you search a sleeping prisoner who is actually tunnelling, the fallacy will be immediately revealed - his face will be replaced by a papier mache dummy with a face painted on the front, enough to trick your guards into not realising what was happening. The tunnel will be revealed and the prisoner will pop out of the ground wherever he is, and will make a run for it.

You can build new Perimeter Walls around your prison, which are very tall, very deep and very expensive. Prisoners will do their best to tunnel around these, and will only tunnel through them if there is no other escape route - and it will take a long time to do so. However you can’t build pipes and electrical utilities through these walls, so you’ll need to plan where your weak-spots are going to be.

We also continue to work towards better right wing controls over your prison, for those that want them. You can now research and unlock a new “Policy” report, which allows you to set the type and amount of punishment doled out for fighting, stealing, rioting etc. The defaults are set to exactly how it was before, but if you choose to you could throw prisoners in solitary confinement for 24 hours after a fight, if you thought that was appropriate. This will have a seriously detrimental effect on that prisoner and he will not cause any more trouble for quite some time. On top of that, from the new Policy screen you can request automatic searches of prisoners and their cells when they go off the rails. Catch a prisoner with an escape tool? Automatically search his cell.

There’s several smaller new features in this alpha as well - see the full change list below for details.

= Escape tunnels Prisoners can now dig escape tunnels when they are supposed to be sleeping They will dig from the toilet in their cell outwards, avoiding buildings and walls as best they can They will tend to dig along water pipes, especially large pipes, because these make the job much quicker They require a digging tool stolen from somewhere in the prison, and will stash this in their cell Searching a prisoner or his cell whilst he is tunnelling will reveal the tunnel Prisoners are motivated to dig escape tunnels if they fear for their lives (dangerous prison AND non-violent inmate), or if they have a very high Freedom need, meaning they've been locked up in their cell for days

- New material: Perimeter wall This is an EXPENSIVE new wall type designed to prevent escape tunnels - a very high and very deep wall. Tunnellers will do their best to dig around it. It can be tunnelled through, but it will take much longer than a normal wall. Note: You cannot build utilities through a perimeter wall, and building one will sever any existing utilities in those squares.

- You can remove tunnels you have uncovered by using the new material "Remove Tunnels"

= Policy report You can now control the punishments handed out to prisoners when they fight, escape, destroy things etc. This is unlocked from Bureaucracy by the Chief, and gives you a new "Policy" report. You can also request automatic searching of the prisoner and/or his cell when misconduct occurs. Eg a prisoner caught with a tool may be digging escape tunnels, so you can auto-search his cell

- Needs system continued - Prisoners now have an Environment need, representing the cleanliness of their surroundings. Hire Janitors! - Prisoners now have a Privacy need. This can only be discharged by them spending time alone in their own cell. - The previous "Defense" need is now called Safety. It charges up when they feel in danger. As a result of these changes, all Prisoner Biographies will be re-generated when you load an alpha-12 or earlier save game.

- Cells, holding cells and solitary cells must now be "Enclosed", which means surrounded by walls and doors. There will be no more building tons of open cells in a giant indoor area without any walls separating them.

- You can now perform several different types of search on any object or prisoner: - Search Prisoner/Object : Simply searches the prisoner/object and nothing else - Search Cell : Searches the prisoner and his cell - Search Cell Block : Searches all prisoners and hiding places within the current cell block

- Patrol system update We are changing the patrol system to work differently and better. Previously Guards would auto-follow any patrol within their own sector, but wouldn't go outside the sector In this new system, you must assign guards to a patrol manually by clicking on an existing patrol square The immediate advantage is that you can specify exactly which patrols are walked, and by how many guards Patrols can now go through multiple sectors as they are no longer connected.

- Popup Markers have been disabled for Alpha 13, because we broke them really bad

- It now takes 50% longer to serve one year of a prison sentence

- Nav system changes: There should be a lot less failed routing, and entities should now perform better when cut off from the rest of the world.

Just curious, but what if you manage to make tons and tons and tons of money and try to make the Perimeter Walls 2+ thick? Would that have any effect? I hope it counts as another tile to path through. I could imagine they might get pathing problems or just confused in between if you don't prepare for the guy who makes it rich.

Soon as i let prisoners in... FIIIIIGHT! Seems i left an escape route! lol (been a few weeks since i played)
Then i checked my needs and saw they were all pretty god damn bad... MORE FIIIGHTS! lol
Few days later... Everything was back to normal and there needs were practically zero and i found two escape tunnels! (they no longer wanted to escape though lol)

Things i noticed....

You can not have a shower in the holding cell or cells no more due to it breaking requirements.
Prisoners come in with needs from the start rather than being happy as larry! (well they did in my game anyhow)
Cable bug still exists i got fed up trying sort it out so laundry and a few cells had no power

Definatly like how rooms requires doors though, and even though i didnt try the large holding cell thing just now id like to know what happens so that be tomorrows test i think